Over at UD there's a $1000 prize (judges not named) for "anyone who is able to demonstrate that the design of a living thing by an intelligent agent necessarily requires a supernatural act."

No prize is being offered for anyone who can calculate the CSI of any living organism.

No prize is being offered for anyone who can cite an instance of design being implemented, other than by humans. No prize for what. No prize for when, No prize for how.

No prize is being offered for explaining where or how a finite (non-supernatural) designer stores the 10^500 bits of information regarding fitness landscapes and coding sequences that would be required to design without using some form of GA. (Assuming, of course, that fitness landscapes really are as rugged as claimed by ID advocates.)

Over at UD there's a $1000 prize (judges not named) for "anyone who is able to demonstrate that the design of a living thing by an intelligent agent necessarily requires a supernatural act."

No prize is being offered for anyone who can calculate the CSI of any living organism.

No prize is being offered for anyone who can cite an instance of design being implemented, other than by humans. No prize for what. No prize for when, No prize for how.

No prize is being offered for explaining where or how a finite (non-supernatural) designer stores the 10^500 bits of information regarding fitness landscapes and coding sequences that would be required to design without using some form of GA. (Assuming, of course, that fitness landscapes really are as rugged as claimed by ID advocates.)

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

I'm interested in how gil and ba77 will approach this, since they assume the designer is god. They obviously have no problem with infinite resources..

I'd be more interested in StephenB's attempt. Isn't the main part of his schtick that methodological naturalism, by limiting itself to natural explanations, is attempting to discriminate against ID? By his reasoning, supernatural causation is *REQUIRED* in design theory.

--------------It's natural to be curious about our world, but the scientific method is just one theory about how to best understand it. We live in a democracy, which means we should treat every theory equally. - Steven Colbert, I Am America (and So Can You!)

I'm interested in how gil and ba77 will approach this, since they assume the designer is god. They obviously have no problem with infinite resources..

I'd be more interested in StephenB's attempt. Isn't the main part of his schtick that methodological naturalism, by limiting itself to natural explanations, is attempting to discriminate against ID? By his reasoning, supernatural causation is *REQUIRED* in design theory.

The big tent does not cover any foolishly consistent hobgoblins.

--------------Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.

As a general comment though, this looks like a challenge to ID more than it is to evolutionary scientists. I doubt any evo biologists would have an issue with the idea of an intelligent agent being able to design a living thing. Perhaps a more pertinent and direct challenge would be to show that supernatural intervention is not required to create life – when no material intelligent agent already exists – otherwise it is just inviting infinite regress (is a supernatural event required to produce the non supernatural intelligence that designed the life or do we invoke another material designer as the designer of the designer)

This requires a bit of head spinning. What kind of non-supernatural entity designs the first life?

If none is required, how is this different from naturalism? If it is required, the contest is won.

ETA:

The loudspeaker in the ceiling just deleted most of DrBot's post, specifically the part I quoted above.

Barry, thanks for the reply, I think some things still need clarification. For a start, I asked about non material minds and in reply you said:

Quote

Therefore, I am going to make a bold assumption for the sake of argument. Let us assume for the sake of argument that intelligent agents do NOT have free will, i.e., that the tertium quid does not exist. Let us assume instead, for the sake of argument, that the cause of all activity of all intelligent agents can be reduced to physical causes.

You responded with a statement about free will where you assume that it cannot exist in systems which operate according to the laws of physics. I don't have a problem with the idea that a material mind has free will, or conversely I can see that a non-material mind could equally lack free will. Free will in this context is not related to the issue of how 'mind' is defined.

Would the simplest thing be to state, as a premise for the competition, that a mind, intentionality and consciousness can all be produced by matter?

As a general comment though, this looks like a challenge to ID more than it is to evolutionary scientists. I doubt any evo biologists would have an issue with the idea of an intelligent agent being able to design a living thing. Perhaps a more pertinent and direct challenge would be to show that supernatural intervention is not required to create life - when no material intelligent agent already exists - otherwise it is just inviting infinite regress (is a supernatural event required to produce the non supernatural intelligence that designed the life or do we invoke another material designer as the designer of the designer)

This is the root question isn't it - how was life created, not how or in what way does it evolve once it exists.

I won't take up the challenge because I don't think that a supernatural act is required to produce life, most scientists I know would probably agree, but I look forward to seeing some of the ID supporters taking it up, and thanks for issuing the challenge (I mean that sincerely)

--------------Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.

As a general comment though, this looks like a challenge to ID more than it is to evolutionary scientists. I doubt any evo biologists would have an issue with the idea of an intelligent agent being able to design a living thing. Perhaps a more pertinent and direct challenge would be to show that supernatural intervention is not required to create life – when no material intelligent agent already exists – otherwise it is just inviting infinite regress (is a supernatural event required to produce the non supernatural intelligence that designed the life or do we invoke another material designer as the designer of the designer)

This requires a bit of head spinning. What kind of non-supernatural entity designs the first life?

If none is required, how is this different from naturalism? If it is required, the contest is won.

ETA:

The loudspeaker in the ceiling just deleted most of DrBot's post, specifically the part I quoted above.

Hardly surprising. Barry seems to construct elaborate rhetorical traps in his mind and can't seem to handle it when his presumed opponent deviates from the script Barry so helpfully wrote for him/her.

--------------It's natural to be curious about our world, but the scientific method is just one theory about how to best understand it. We live in a democracy, which means we should treat every theory equally. - Steven Colbert, I Am America (and So Can You!)

Over at UD there's a $1000 prize (judges not named) for "anyone who is able to demonstrate that the design of a living thing by an intelligent agent necessarily requires a supernatural act."

No prize is being offered for anyone who can calculate the CSI of any living organism.

No prize is being offered for anyone who can cite an instance of design being implemented, other than by humans. No prize for what. No prize for when, No prize for how.

No prize is being offered for explaining where or how a finite (non-supernatural) designer stores the 10^500 bits of information regarding fitness landscapes and coding sequences that would be required to design without using some form of GA. (Assuming, of course, that fitness landscapes really are as rugged as claimed by ID advocates.)

Good post. I like the comments “to have written 800 papers is regarded as something to boast about rather than being shameful” and “with far fewer papers being published, reviewers, grant committees and promotion committees might be able to read the papers, not just count them.”

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Good post. I like the comments “to have written 800 papers is regarded as something to boast about rather than being shameful” and “with far fewer papers being published, reviewers, grant committees and promotion committees might be able to read the papers, not just count them.”

Quote

led to a situation where any paper, however bad, can now be printed in a journal that claims to be peer-reviewed.

He is referring to bio-complexity, isn't he?

--------------Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.

Memo to CNN: After the Ardi and Ida pfffft’s, what religion do we join, so we can not believe in your latest babe, Sediba?

Nothing wrong with Ardi as a fossil, only certain IDiots who don't realize how many design events are required for homonins - they just engage in denial. Ida is an example of a sparse record, of course there is going to be different ideas on where it is in the tree of life.

What you should do is get your science news from journal articles. Of course if you tried...

Quote

Wanda: [after Otto breaks in on Wanda and Archie in Archie's flat and hangs him out the window] I was dealing with something delicate, Otto. I'm setting up a guy who's incredibly important to us, who's going to tell me where the loot is and if they're going to come and arrest you. And you come loping in like Rambo without a jockstrap and you dangle him out a fifth-floor window. Now, was that smart? Was it shrewd? Was it good tactics? Or was it stupid?

Otto West: Don't call me stupid.

Wanda: Oh, right! To call you stupid would be an insult to stupid people! I've known sheep that could outwit you. I've worn dresses with higher IQs. But you think you're an intellectual, don't you, ape?

Otto West: Apes don't read philosophy.

Wanda: Yes they do, Otto. They just don't understand it. Now let me correct you on a couple of things, OK? Aristotle was not Belgian. The central message of Buddhism is not "Every man for himself." And the London Underground is not a political movement. Those are all mistakes, Otto. I looked them up.

Remember Densy's blunder in saying that a circular phylogenetic tree diagram was not a tree?

--------------"Following what I just wrote about fitness, you’re taking refuge in what we see in the world." PaV

He has some rather strong associations in the conspiracy world with people who blame Israel for 9/11.

Just looking briefly at the truther sewer, he might have disassociated himself from that. Or not. It's difficult to tell who's in and who's out. What a mess.

I have a personal reason for thinking the Trade Center theorists are full of shit. They talk about the fire not being hot enough.

I live a few blocks from a church that burned a few years ago. It had a frame made of steel I-beams which bent like cooked spaghetti in the fire. There was no additional fuel. It was just a routine fire.

--------------Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.